Dame Edna Everage is surely the most popular and most gifted woman in the world today. Housewife, investigative journalist, social anthropologist, talk-show host, swami, children's-book illustrator, megastar, celebrity spin doctor, and icon.

She is the creation of Australian actor/writer Barry Humphries, a character he invented decades ago. Humphries is 75, but Dame Edna — this ebullient but tart-tongued lady with lilac-colored hair and a fondness for gladiolas — says she is "approaching 60 from the wrong direction, but I am amazingly well preserved, with no cosmetic surgery." The Tony Award winner is currently on "My First Last Tour," which stops at the Colonial Theatre next weekend.

Your "First Last Tour?" Please explain.
I'm not trying to do a Cher. I'm in my element up there on stage. Which is why when I say it's "my first last tour," I'm wondering to what extent I really mean that. I think I would probably not be able to do this without the company of my public.

They do adore you.
I don't say "adulation." This business of leaping to your feet and saying, say, to Liza Minnelli, "We love you, Liza!" — which poor needy little Liza desperately needs — I can't bear it. Two hairdressers came up to me and said, "We love you Edna!", and I said, "I don't love you." That's called honesty. People like the fact that I'm not needy. I think it's a very unappealing thing in the theater.

You have fun with your audience — possums, as you call them — but you mortify them too.
I really invented interactive theater. And when I see people in the front row, or further back, I feel I want to get to know them. To me, the audience is the show. Every night is different because the audience is different every night. And I love to chat with them. I invite people onto the stage, and there are wonderful prizes I give members of the audience. Pretty well every penny of profit is plowed back into that audience.

How, exactly?
It's a hard thing to describe. They are getting it back as therapy. They come here, and it's edifying, cathartic, and there's a certain amount of osmosis going on as well. Osmosis, because they see the world through my glasses. All the art of the theater really is someone — a gifted writer or performer — sharing his view of the world, briefly, with an audience who is sick of their own view. They really want to trade in their perception of the universe for someone else's — preferably mine. I'm not making a guarantee, but there are healing properties in my show. The cleaners of the theaters tell me after the show about the things they find. Last night, they found one neck brace, three pairs of false teeth, an artificial leg. People have left no longer requiring these things.

You're like our Lady of Lourdes!
I am a one-woman Lourdes! That's a big claim to make. And it's one Cher doesn't make. Think about it. It is not within her radar.

Cross Town Traffic at the Wilbur When bespectacled alt-comic icon David Cross paid a visit to the Wilbur Theatre last October, he giddily tore Boston “a new asshole” — but, hey, at least he was kind enough to have “stitched that new asshole up with jokes.”

Jen Kirkman works the laugh track During her more lucid moments, the Newton-born Kirkman writes for TV shows including the NBC sit-com Perfect Couples , is a regular contributor to E!'s Chelsea Lately , and does stand-up across the country. She returns to Boston with the Women in Comedy Festival March 9-13.

Funny you should say that I'm pretty confident in saying that humor is probably one of the key things that separates us humans from the rest of the animal kingdom.

Jesse Eisenberg and Nick Swardson get to work Following his star turn as a ruthless, if socially awkward, billionaire in David Fincher's The Social Network, Jesse Eisenberg returns to the screen as a downtrodden pizza delivery boy-man in Ruben Fleischer's 30 Minutes or Less. Nick Swardson plays Eisenberg's tormentor.

Dane Cook is funny There are two things that non-comedians feel the need to tell me when discussing comedy. One is "Bob Saget is filthy." The other is "Dane Cook is not funny."

Interview: Kathy Griffin "I think Ryan Seacrest and Oprah will finally be together, and it will be like one of those great '70s cover-up movies and I'm playing the body."

Northern exposure While New York is grittier, Los Angeles juicier, and Boston is wicked smahter, for some odd reason it is Montreal that, for two weeks every summer, becomes the epicenter of the comedy universe.

Special delivery For the last two decades, comedian and SNL alum Norm MacDonald has been firing off on pop culture and sharing life observations with his disarming deadpan delivery and signature subtleties through a stoner Canadian accent and nasal drawl.

AFTER IMAGES | May 28, 2010 Karen Finley won’t be naked, or covered in chocolate. Candied yams will not be involved. If there are neighborhood morality-watch squads in Salem, they’ll have the night off.

INTERVIEW: SARAH SILVERMAN | April 23, 2010 Recently, “Sarah” — the character played by Sarah Silverman on Comedy Central’s The Sarah Silverman Program — was upset because in today’s world it just wasn’t safe anymore for children to get into strangers’ vans.

TATTOO YOU | April 06, 2010 Dr. Lakra is no more a real doctor than is Dr. Dre or Dr. Demento. The 38-year-old Mexican tattoo artist’s real name is Jerónimo López Ramírez. As for “lakra,” it means “delinquent.” Or so I thought.

INTERVIEW: DAMON WAYANS | February 16, 2010 "Right now, my intent is not to offend. I just want to laugh. I want to suspend reality."